Co-research as kaleidoscope

This article examines how co-research is enacted in practice by analysing a 15 month research project that explored children’s and young people’s experiences of family work in Finland. Two young adults with lived experience in child welfare were employed as co- researchers and collaborated throughout the research process with four academic researchers. Drawing on diaries, Teams discussions, morning walk conversations, and documentation from workshops with children and young people, we conceptualise co-research through an analytical distinction between the “co” and the “research.” While this distinction is partly artificial, it proved productive for illuminating how relational practices and research practices evolve interdependently. Our analysis shows that sustaining the “co” required intentionally created relational spaces that enabled trust, emotional work, and ongoing negotiation of roles and expertise. The “research” dimension involved shared tasks, methodological experimentation—including the creative “painting with data” method—and collective meaning-making. Across all phases, the boundaries between co-researchers and academic researchers remained fluid, with participants inhabiting multiple positions over time. We argue that distinguishing between the “co” and the “research” enhances the rigour and transparency of co-research by making visible the processes through which knowledge is collaboratively produced. For us, the metaphor of co-research as a kaleidoscope captures both the methodological fluidity and relational accountability central to coresearch. Conducting co-research requires a continuous, dynamic, and shifting configuration of perspectives, competencies, and experiences through which new insights emerge.